


HOW TO BECOME A CHAMPION (in 4 easy steps)

by Mikkeneko



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Families of Choice, Family, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Humor, Obsessive Behavior, POV Second Person, Suicidal Thoughts, Tissue Warning, warrior hawke- Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-25
Updated: 2015-09-25
Packaged: 2018-04-23 07:14:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4867883
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mikkeneko/pseuds/Mikkeneko
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>So you want to become a Champion. How do you go about doing it?</p>
            </blockquote>





	HOW TO BECOME A CHAMPION (in 4 easy steps)

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by “[How To Lose Weight In Four Easy Steps.](https://medium.com/@AaronBleyaert/how-to-lose-weight-in-4-easy-steps-1f135f7e1dec)”

_Dear Champion of Kirkwall,_

_WHAT is your secret?? Ive heard of your heroics from the Tale of the Champion and I cant believe it, youre so good at what you do. HOW did you go from a Ferelden country bumpkin to one of Thedases most accomplished warriors??_

_Regards,_

_Fan 5ever_

* * *

 

Dear 5ever,

Sometimes I wonder that very same thing myself! It’s definitely not where I saw myself ten years ago, and I’m not entirely sure even now how it happened. But I’ve had a lot of people ask questions like yours, so I sat down and I came up with four helpful tips that I hope will let you achieve everything I have. So here goes.

* * *

 

**HOW TO BECOME A CHAMPION IN 4 EASY STEPS**

**1 - Practice, practice, practice!**

The key to mastering any physical art is drill, baby, drill. You’ve got to keep doing the same exercises long after you’re sick of them, because it’s all about burning the movements into your muscles. When you’re in a combat situation and have a flight of Tal-Vashoth spears homing in on your space, your reflexes have to do the fighting for you.

**2 - Never be afraid to learn more.**

Hubris is the enemy. No matter how good you are, there’s always someone better. Seek out accomplished swordsmen and women and try for a chance to spar with them, or at least get a chance to watch them work. Don’t let tunnel-vision close off other possibilities you may find in other schools of martial arts, either – I learned one of my most effective moves from watching a dual-wielding rogue. Always be open to new ideas.

**3 - Watch your family die before your eyes.**

And not just peacefully, in his sleep, the way your father died years ago, leaving you to look after your mother and siblings alone. Watch your baby brother die a fool or a martyr when he tries to take on an ogre five times his size and get his bones reduced to splinters for it. Watch your little sister die in your arms, choking on her own blood as the Taint creeps through her veins and melds with the slithering darkness of the tunnels around you that you brought her to. Watch your mother stutter out her last tortured breaths with her face stitched hideously onto another woman’s body by a madman, and know that you could have saved her if only you’d been faster, started sooner, tried harder. Watch everything you ever knew and loved be taken from you, by blight or blood, and know just how deeply you have failed.

Put on the Champion’s armor. Go out and fight some more bad guys, because Maker knows this city never seems to run out of them. Fight the Tevinter slaver mages who come to prey on the elves in the Alienage. Fight the gang lords who roam the streets at night and terrorize the people whose homes are unfortunate enough to fall into their territories. Fight the qunari renegades who view you and all your kind as less than scum, as things, as easy prey for the strong to take whatever they want from you. Fight them until your armor is dripping with blood, until the blood makes puddles on the ground, until your underpadding is soaked with sweat and mud and piss and shit and you drag yourself back to your echoingly empty mansion and fall into bed still in your armor, praying to the Maker for a few hours of sleep without dreams.

Get up the next morning. Do it again. Do it again until the streets are empty, until the caverns under Lowtown are clear, until the Wounded Coast goes quiet at last because there’s no one left to fight. Drill. Practice your swordsmanship in the empty back yard of your godforsaken empty mansion until the sun sends sweat pouring down your back to make puddles on the ground and your limbs are screaming and your head is pounding and the light is fading and it’s dark. Go back inside and eat your dinner alone. Fall into bed. Try not to dream.

Get up the next morning and do it again. Ask at the Hanged Man, ask at the Chantry board, ask at the Gallows for any job to keep you moving, to keep your body busy and your mind numb. Hike to Sundermount and spend a day slogging hip deep in the mud looking for one rare flower that only blooms on the autumn equinox under an oak tree where a hanged man’s blood fell or what ever fucking thing it is. Go to the mine where your countrymen slave away and fight bandits, fight deepstalkers, fight a fucking dragon. Fight it until your hands are numb from beating against the scales, your swords are scrap metal, your armor is scorched and oxidized from the heat of the flames, until every fiber of your body is screaming in agony and it’s still not as much as what Mother must have felt. Make more puddles of blood on the ground, standing over the dead thing’s corpse, blood dripping off your mangled sword, blood leaking out of the cracks in your armor.

Wonder if there’s more dragons out there to fight. Wonder if they’re bigger. Wonder if they’d be enough to finish you off. Wonder where you can go to find them.

Go back to your empty mansion, dragging trails of soot behind you, fall into bed. Dream of fire and blood and vile taint and come awake in the middle of the night, choking on your own tears like Bethany choked on her blood. Make puddles of tears on your bedroom floor.

Get up the next morning and do it again.

Bring your friends. Bring the elf, because there’s nothing he likes better than killing Tevinter slavers. Bring the warden, because there’s nothing he hates more than blood mages terrorizing the populace. Bring the dwarf, because he’s writing this all down in his book somewhere, and somehow when he tells the stories later it’s always a lot more romantic. Blood spatters, but only a little and is gone by the next scene. Heroes always shout witty banter as they fight and there’s much less in the way of piss.

Bring the pirate, because she has an easy laugh and a wicked smile and she has no shame and she can pick any lock. Bring the Dalish, because her heart is wide open even now, because she smiles and giggles and makes the sun shine a little brighter even on Sundermount, where it’s always raining.

Bring Aveline because she’s the last one left who remembers Ferelden, who remembers Carver, because she stood with you through all of it and she never left your side, never let you down, she saw you at your worst and she’s still here, somehow, loyal and brave and so, so strong despite everything she’s lost.

Bring Fenris because the way he swings his sword makes you think of Carver, and it hurts inside but it’s a good hurt, too. Bring Merrill because her sunny cheer is like Bethany’s, and while that pain will never go away it’s good to remember that there is still goodness in the world, too. Bring Varric because he understands people, he understands you, he knows when to raise the mood with a joke and when to just be there in silence. Bring Isabela because she’s never judged you, because she’s failed and she’s made mistakes and she had the chance to run away from it all and she found the courage to come back anyway.

Bring Anders because he’ll be there, at your side, at your back, faithful and stalwart. Bring Anders because he can make the bleeding stop, he can drive the shadows back, he can stand strong between you and death and make death back down. Bring Anders because he cares so much, he gives so much, he still believes in the goodness of men and he still believes in you. Bring Anders because he can stop the pain.

Leave your empty echoing mansion and go to the Hanged Man, find your friends waiting for you there, laughing and smiling and opening their arms and their hearts to welcome you home. Realize that the first family you make in the world is your blood family, and you’ll always be true to that, but with time and wear enough eventually your blood family will leave you, one way or another. Realize that your next family is the one that you find, the one that you choose, the one that you make, and that they’ve shed blood with you and they’ve shed tears with you and they’re every bit as much your family as your blood family.

Realize you don’t have to be alone any more.

Find the courage to go on.

**4 - Eat big breakfasts!**

Gotta preload those carbs!!

* * *

 

~end.


End file.
